South
China Sea, 16N, 114E, 2018. Captain Charles (Charlie) Brown is
flying Number 2 in a battle formation of four F-35Cs acting as
Offensive-Counter-Air ‘sweepers’ for a flight of four Super
Hornets inbound for a JSOW strike on Woody Island. A large military
deployment on the Island is denying free passage throughout the South
China Sea, and several new oil drilling platforms have been active
around the Spratly and Paracel Islands. The United Nations is not
amused by this claim of sovereignty over the region, and has resolved
to remove the deployment by force.

The
task has been assigned to the USN, and a Carrier Battle Group lead by
CVN-76 Ronald Reagan is in the area. The plan is to cut the runway
and disable the port facilities, then force a withdrawal from the
Island under terms dictated by the UN/USN coalition task force.

Number
3 of the F-35C sweepers gets a contact from his APG-81 radar, and the
four inbound bogeys are shown across the network. Analysis of signals
from the bogeys identifies them as Russian built Su-35S, previously
seen moving on Woody Island by satellite recon. All the F-35Cs arm
their four AIM-120D missiles and prepare for a ‘turkey shoot’,
expecting to get ‘first-look, first-shot, first kill’. ‘Ah’,
thinks Charlie, ‘this will be like the AN/AAQ-37 EO DAS
advertisement: ‘manoeuvrability is irrelevant …let the missiles
do the turning’.

What
Charlie Brown doesn’t realise is that such marketing hype was only
partly right. In today’s day and age, manoeuvrability becomes
irrelevant when faced with high agility, more particularly extreme
agility, defined as extreme manoeuvrability + extreme controllability
– a deadly combination best achieved with 3D TVC engines, widely
spaced, interoperated with rapid response dynamic digital flight
controls in airframes with highly relaxed static stability in the
longitudinal and, in the case of the PAK-FA, directional axes.

The
Flankers with their extreme agility come in range at 60 miles, and
the F-35C flight sorts targets and fires a pair of AIM-120Ds at each
Flanker. The seconds tick by agonisingly slowly as the missiles fly
out to their targets, and each pilot watches for the tell-tale radar
bloom of a kill. The AN/ASQ-239 “Barracuda” Electronic Warfare
system shows considerable activity from each Flanker and then …. a
single bloom indicating one Flanker has been hit.

South China Sea Scenario

A
pair
of
Su-35S
prototypes, B/N 901 and 902 (KnAAPO).

Range
is now 40 Nm and closing at 1,100 Nm/hr. The F-35C’s EO DAS
detects four missile launch “flares” from each Flanker, twelve in
all, and APG-81 radar detects missiles inbound. The F-35Cs each fire
their two remaining AIM-120Ds and turn sixty degrees to maintain
datalink command guidance of their missiles via the APG-81 AESA
antenna. The cockpit MFDs show that the Flankers have broken away
though 120 degrees, with the IRBIS-Es' swivelling antenna heads
maintaining guidance contact. The AIM-120Ds, now chasing a retreating
target, will fall short. The F-35Cs are not so lucky and they all
break as the EO DAS senses the incoming R-77M missiles. Small active
radiofrequency decoys and flares are ejected. One JSF is killed with
an R-77ME missile with an active radar seeker, another with a
tail-pipe hit from an R-77TE with an infrared seeker. Charlie’s
JSF is now on full burner, heading for the deck and passing Mach 1.3
when ‘whoomp’ – the back-end explodes, and the cockpit is
shrill with alarms and festooned with red displays of failure
warnings. There is no response from the stick and he reaches for the
ejection handle. A blast and excruciating pain as large chards of the
shattered canopy knife into his upper body, then silence as the
‘chute’ opens.

Charlie
has a bird’s-eye view as the Flankers tear into the Super Hornet
Strikers. JSOWs are jettisoned and they hurriedly fire their
AIM-120C5s – all miss. The Super Hornet’s defensive ALE-55 decoy
does a good-job on the R-77MEs with active radar seekers, but not
those with modern imaging-infrared seekers. Two Super Hornets are lost
to
these BVR missiles. The three Flankers close, and rapidly dispatch
the remaining two Strikers. One is killed with a pair of infrared
R-73 Archers, and the other with a burst from the GSH-301 30mm
cannon.

And
the final count: one Flanker killed, four F-35Cs and four Super
Hornets killed for a Flanker vs USN Loss-Exchange Rate of 1:7.

Fiction
or Prediction? In the rapidly evolving world of future air combat,
costly combat capabilities are being countered before the aircraft
become operational. Those combat aircraft built to an obsolete
specification are effectively dead before they fly.

Above, below: left and
right countermeasures dispenser bay doors opened (US Air Force).

Take
‘stealth’
as
an
example. The original concept remains very
sound, but can lead, through intellectual laziness, to several design
and development consequences that will, if not addressed, lose future
air combat fights.

Stealth
is incompatible with classical “endgame” active electronic
countermeasures for two reasons: firstly radiating large amounts of
power ‘gives the game away’ and secondly, large wideband
wide-angle radiofrequency power emissions require large low-loss
apertures, which are difficult to make highly stealthy. So the F-22A
and the JSF are not reported to currently carry all aspect active
electronic defences. Unless equipped with internal endgame
radio-frequency countermeasures, if they are detected, their defences
are limited and their loss rate can be high, especially if they are
unable to defeat the inbound weapon kinematically1.

Long-range
missiles are also considered “not important” by many planners,
because stealth allows a medium range missile shot before the
adversary is aware you are there. Unfortunately, ‘Low-Observability’
is not the same as ‘No-Observability’. As fighter radars on
large aircraft like the Su-35S and the PAK-FA deploy increased
antenna size and much increased emitted radiofrequency power, and
adopt advanced signal management though Active Electronically Scanned
Arrays (AESAs), the formerly invisible tennis ball becomes a bright
star. And a jet engine producing 40,000 lbs of thrust, is another
bright star to a modern staring focal plane infrared sensor.

The
mantra ‘manoeuvrability is irrelevant … let the missiles do the
turning,’ is another dangerous misconception popular in the
contemporary planning community. If the enemy does not have stealthy
aircraft, they have to rely on several layers of countermeasures,
manoeuvre being one. And it works. Blasting a simple-minded missile
with clever deceptive waveforms, putting a towed decoy in its path
and confusing it with forward and rear firing chaff can hide the true
target, making it miss. Simple Newtonian physics shows that an
aircraft at Mach 0.9 with a 9G turning capability can easily out-turn
and avoid Mach 3.6 missiles with a 40G turning capability. Another
miss.

Those
who believe in the absolute impenetrability of ‘stealth’ create a
deadly delusion: ‘you can’t see me, so you can’t fire at me, so
I don’t need to care about terminal endgame countermeasures’. The
problem is, the enemy can see the F-22A close up, can see the
F-35 from quite a range, especially side and rear on, and can fire
missiles with radar and infra-red seekers. So when these missiles
close on an aircraft without effective terminal endgame
countermeasures, they kill. The F-22A’s kinematics give it a fair
chance of escaping a missile shot – the F-35 JSF very little
chance. How does a Mach 1.5 JSF (JORD spec is Mach 1.5 S&L @ 30
kft ISA) escape a Mach 2.25 Sukhoi, especially when the Sukhoi has
fuel to burn?

So,
the foregoing description of a future air combat fight tells the
story of changing capabilities, changing tactics, and changing
Loss-Exchange-Ratios.

Why
are we observing such a single-minded rejection of the need for
effective endgame defences on Western combat aircraft? It is a direct
by-product of a steadfast belief in Western military bureaucracies
that most if not all future air combat will occur in the Beyond
Visual Range (BVR) domain. There is no real evidence to support this
idea, as the heavily “asymmetrical” conditions observed in air
campaigns fought from 1991 through 2003 were unique and very unlikely
to be repeated in the future. The advent of very long range
“anti-AWACS” missiles, advanced conventional fighters like the
Su-35S, and the stealthy PAK-FA, will result in far more
“symmetrical” air campaigns, where the conditions permitting
frequent or predominant Beyond Visual Range missile engagements will
arise infrequently. Most air combat engagements will devolve into
close combat, where “traditional” fighter virtues will be
paramount. What follows then?

Agility
is important. Countermeasures are important. The effects can be
summarised in this table:

The
‘Winners’
Corner

Agility

Good

Poor

Endgame
Electronic Counter- Measures

Good

F-22E
PAK-FA
Su-35S

F/A-18
Super Hornet

Undisclosed

F-22A

F-35
JSF

How
the effects of stealth, countermeasures and agility play out depends
on the combatant’s relative capabilities and the tactics employed.
However, there is certainty about this: it is better to have superior
agility; it is better to have effective countermeasures; but it is best
to have both!

The
US Navy is putting its fragile eggs in the F-35 JSF and the Super
Hornet
basket. This is tactically very dangerous.

F/A-18E/F/G: This aircraft has excellent
countermeasures, but if the adversaries
have equally good or better countermeasures and can out-manoeuvre the
Super Hornet’s missiles and airframe, then the inevitable result of
any engagements will be the destruction of the Super Hornets; and,

F-35 JSF:
Because of the paradox of a stealthy aircraft actively jamming
missiles, it is vulnerable to attack, especially within the
rear-quarter from radar and infra-red guided missiles; once the
aircraft is detected, then escaping from a much faster, more agile
enemy is unlikely; high loss rates are predicted.

The
F-22A’s Raptor countermeasures capabilities have not been disclosed
publicly. The passive sensors and systems are listed, but no public
information is available, as it is for other types, on active,
terminal countermeasures. The logic - or illogic if you will – that
a stealth aircraft does not need them suggests there are none. However
to remain effective, the F-22 needs to maintain its margin of
superiority over newcomers like the PAK-FA and the Su-35S and actives
countermeasures will be part of the capability solution, especially
when engagements are closer, faster and at ranges where even VLO
aircraft can be detected and tracked.

Following
the example of a very successful and cost-effective development of
the F-15E from the F-15A&C, the F-22A needs to be developed along
the lines of the Strike Eagle – a two-place, much enhanced “F-22E”
fighter with the rear seat Weapons System Officer monitoring sensor
feeds, advising the pilot and managing the passive and active
terminal countermeasures – and, yes, it must have the agility and
persistence to overmatch both the PAK-FA and the Su-35S.

What
they will also need is effective countermeasures that don’t
compromise stealth. This capability must be deployed only when
needed. The ALE-55 is a good example – a towed decoy that emits
signal waveforms derived from the on-board RFS/ESM and
countermeasures generator, with a fibre-optic cable that could be
reeled out to meet threats and retracted or jettisoned after the
threat has passed. Small, powered ‘smart’ air-launched decoys
with an aircraft-like infra-red or radio-frequency signature are
another.

Manufacturers make stealthy gun-port openings and the F-22
has stealthy countermeasures bays on the fuselage sides, so they
should be able to make stealthy electronic warfare openings large
enough for effective countermeasures systems – the small and
stealthy RFS/ESM antennas can collect the enemy’s signals
continuously, the internal countermeasures generator forms the
jamming waves for radar seekers, and directed energy for infrared
seekers. The countermeasure bays open, ports blast out disruptive
radiofrequency and infrared energy as needed, then the bays close and
allow the fighter to fade back into the ether.

One
advantage of true stealth aircraft is that their much lower radar
signatures reduce the emitted power demands for an endgame electronic
countermeasures suite. Rather than emitting kiloWatts, such a system
can be viable emitting less than 100 Watts of power. While this has
the enormous benefit of removing the need for large thermionic
transmitters and supporting waveguides, it does not remove the need
for jammer receiver hardware, processor hardware, techniques
generator hardware, and embedded software, all of which incur
maintenance, weight, volume, power and cooling demands.

Large
stealth fighters like the F-22 and PAK-FA are big beneficiaries,
insofar as they are large enough to incorporate internal endgame
countermeasures without significant performance and capacity
penalties. The much less stealthy F-35 would require much more
emitter power to protect its more vulnerable beam and tail sectors,
while it is severely challenged in weight, volume, power and cooling,
making integration of a robust all aspect endgame electronic
countermeasures suite a difficult engineering challenge, for which a
genuinely satisfactory design solution may not exist2.

Some
argue that the AESA radars fitted to the F-22A and the F-35 will be
effective ‘Directed Energy Weapons’ (DEWs) that will destroy
incoming missiles. There are three ‘difficulties’ with this
notion. Firstly, AESA modules can only steer the energy beam within
a cone angled about 120 degrees centred on the AESA boresight –
leaving the remaining 240 degrees of the sphere unprotected. Secondly,
AESA radars cover a limited bandwidth – how will its
directed energy negate ‘out-of-band’ missile seekers, especially
infra-red? Thirdly, ‘hardening’ missiles against DEW attack is a
relatively simple and low cost exercise – there are already signs
that this is taking place, e.g. active laser proximity fuses
replacing radio-frequency fuses on Russian missiles.

Finally,
a ‘blinding glimpse of the bleeding obvious’. If the enemy can
out-manoeuvre your missiles, then the converse of that infamous
advertisement is: ‘if your missiles can’t do the turning, then
smart aircraft are irrelevant’. What the F-22E needs is better
missiles. The MBDA Meteor is a good start, as its throttleable
ramjet lets it slow to a pace where it can do the required turning in
the terminal stage. However, this missile needs an alternate seeker
such as the Infra-red sensor in the AIM-132 AMRAAM. Future missiles
need longer range – not necessarily to kill at greater distances,
but to position to end-game places where its target has poor active
defences or poor stealth performance.

To
conclude, resting on the laurels of the F-22A is not an option. The
Su-35S has seriously dangerous and effective capabilities, even
against an F-22A. The stealthy PAK-FA, albeit in an early phase
of
development, is showing naked air combat power in the form of extreme
plus agility and persistence that, with the addition of advanced
sensors, countermeasures and weapons, will likely soundly defeat the
Raptor but will certainly annihilate the F-35 and the Super Hornet.
Work on the F-22E needs to start immediately and be undertaken with
the urgency required of a grave threat to the national defence and
security of the USA and its Allies.

1
In the electronic warfare game, electronic countermeasures can be
broadly divided into three categories. Support
jamming equipment is used
to defend other aircraft, and primarily disrupts search and
acquisition radars, including engagement radars in upper bands with
autonomous search capabilities. Terminal
or “endgame”
countermeasures are intended to disrupt engagement radars and missile
seekers, and are traditionally carried by all categories of combat
aircraft. Finally, conventional strategic bombers often carry high
power jammers, intended
to disrupt search and acquisition radars at long range, to preclude
cueing of SAM engagement radars or interceptor aircraft. The design
requirements for all three categories are sufficiently different to
usually result in very different equipment designs and installations.
Classical endgame countermeasures carried by conventional tactical
aircraft usually emit 1 to 2 kiloWatts of radiofrequency power,
typically in the X/Ku-Band, but with some designs extending well
below and above these bands.